My "I beat the game" post

I write this mostly for posterity, as I'm sure nothing I'm about to say hasn't been said before or hasn't been said better. I beat the game a couple nights ago and I'm still thinking about it, so I wanted to write my thoughts down.

At the end of act 2, I was a bit disappointed, honestly. This world world is a fake? It's a trope that I don't enjoy in storytelling, and is similar in my mind to "it was all a dream". Combine this with the fact that I wasn't sure where to go next in act 3 where I wouldn't get my butt kicked, and I decided to just head straight to Lumiere to get this game "over with".

Then, the ending came. I finally realized what this game is all about. It's about grief. It's about a family struggling to move on. It's about being stuck in the past. It's about...being a fake version of a dude who died a long, long time ago. At that point it hit me - this game is art.

The music, the gameplay, the graphics, the writing, the acting, and the story are at an insane level of quality, especially when you consider the price point, and especially when you consider that many of those who worked on this game had either junior level experience or no experience working on a game at all. Expedition 33 is truly inspiring, and it enkindles within me a desire to be creative again.

Thank you Sandfall Interactive for being a light in the darkness in the games industry!